‘Every new minister should have the tools they need … only then will we avoid disasters such as the mammoth failure to upgrade NHS software.’
Photograph: Dave Hunt/AAP

NHS data breaches, WannaCry ransomware attacks, ATMs hijacked, fake news, violent jihadist content on YouTube. The challenges posed by today’s digital culture make those I faced with Brent Hoberman when we started lastminute.com nearly 20 years ago seem trifling. Back then we were grappling with early technologies to help make credit card payments on the web safe. Today the difficulties are of a different order of magnitude. And that’s before you begin to think about the future – which promises more big data, autonomous vehicles and the internet of things, with machine learning underpinning it all.

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It is a great surprise to me that the original promise of the web – to redistribute and enable many more voices to be heard – has not been fulfilled. Five large companies – Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft – dominate our online worlds and they have unimaginable power. These tech giants must be held to account. But that requires informed debate and smart policies.

I think the lack of sophisticated discussion about the internet and security in the media, and the knee-jerk reactions to the policy challenges from many parliamentarians, is an extremely serious problem.

Too often everything on the internet is lumped together and blamed. It’s hard to blame those who sometimes get the impression that we would all be safe if only we could just switch it off.

John Kerry gave a masterful lecture last week at the Ditchley Foundation in which he called for elected representatives to be more honest with us all about the real causes of extremism. He specifically talked about social media, reminding the audience of the young people demonstrating in Cairo’s Tahrir Square during the Arab spring. They organised themselves using social media. They were not terrorists – they needed the anonymity that Twitter offers in order to stay safe. And, as Peter Neumann of King’s College London wrote following the London Bridge attacks, it is foolish to think that many people are radicalised exclusively online. “Blaming social media platforms is politically convenient but intellectually lazy,” he said.

That intellectual laziness was exemplified by the calls following the London and Manchester attacks for a ban on end-to-end encryption of messaging systems such as WhatsApp. This form of encryption is integral to a free and secure internet, particularly as we put more and more of our photos, financial transactions and other sensitive information online. We cannot undermine this simply to allow government to declare “enough is enough”. The fact that our leading politicians could make such a call demonstrates the vast gap between the reality of the way the internet functions and their perception of it.

Corporate boards now make digital security a top priority … this has to be true in the public sector, too

As the former head of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, has said: “You can’t un-invent end-to-end encryption … you can’t legislate it away.” Instead, he advocates targeting the individual devices used by terrorists and criminals. “It is vital that we avoid weakening security for everybody to tackle the threat posed by a minority,” he said.

Whether or not you agree with his solution, it is practical policymaking, founded on the realities of the technology. All our politicians should be able to speak in a similarly well informed way.

This week’s announcement of a process for age verification on porn sites is a welcome step – it’s an example of government trying to wrestle with one of the many complex issues that the internet throws up. No one would disagree that young children should be prevented from accessing porn; we all want harmful content kept away from tiny swiping fingers. But, in taking on these issues, we need to be confident that our political leaders understand the mechanisms behind the technology – that they’re not promising without being able to deliver.

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That’s why I believe the disparity between the pace at which innovation is changing citizens’ lives and the ability of policy makers to keep up is one of the most pressing issues of our time.

Corporate boards now make digital security in all its forms a top priority. It would be as unacceptable for a contemporary CEO to claim she did not understand its seriousness as to say she did not understand the balance sheet.

This has to be true in the public sector, too. Every new minister should have the tools they need to ask the right questions when they start a new brief – only then will we avoid disasters such as the mammoth failure to upgrade NHS software.

Clearly there is an urgent need to increase tech skills generally, but this is not enough – we must be relentless in encouraging digital understanding from the highest levels of policymaking down.

That is the prerequisite for being able to talk honestly about the threats we face and make decisions that will keep us safe, both individually and nationally. I fervently believe in the power of an open internet to help in this endeavour. So let’s tone down the alarmist rhetoric that comes from some parts of government and the media so that the debates we must now engage in can be truly well-informed.